We've designed the JustBoom Raspberry Pi Digi HAT to be simple to install and use. With no soldering required and all the mounting hardware already provided this product is suitable for absolute beginners and seasoned professionals alike. Just connect your Digi HAT to external DAC or amplifier/amplified speakers and you can be up and running quickly, enjoying flawless high-quality audio playback within minutes of setting up this Raspberry Pi HAT. We also include an optional IR receiver to allow remote control operation of your Raspberry Pi.

The JustBoom Digi HAT includes a 192kHz/24 bit digital audio chip with low jitter, bit perfect digital output (S/PDIF) over optical or coaxial connectors for an uncompromised high-quality audio experience. The JustBoom Digi HAT includes an output transformer for full galvanic isolation between your Raspberry Pi and your DAC on the coaxial output.

The Raspberry Pi Digi HAT uses the I2S interface for its audio input which reduces CPU load on the Raspberry Pi compared to USB solutions. It is also powered directly from the GPIO header so no extra cables or power supplies are required to connect to the Raspberry Pi. All of the Raspberry Pi GPIO pins are still accessible on the Digi HAT for easy customisation of your project - add additional sensors, buttons, LEDs, rotary encoders or anything your heart desires.

Applications

Pairing the Raspberry Pi with a high-quality digital audio add-on board provides the perfect solution for a number of exciting projects and applications where the standard onboard audio on the Raspberry Pi simply won't cut it. Here are some possible use cases for the JustBoom Raspberry Pi Digi HAT and your Raspberry Pi computer:

Circumstances where you need to have your streaming audio player (Raspberry Pi in this case) located separately from your amplifier or DAC. This method is usually superior to analog since the original digital signal is maintained until the amplification step (theoretically leading to less degradation of the sound).

Streaming (either from cloud or local network) high-definition audio player

Digital signal output over S/PDIF with either optical (TOSLINK) or coaxial (RCA) connectors

We recommend that if you are using the coaxial/RCA output that you connect the cable shield to the ground on the DAC / amplifier you are using and make sure that the DAC / Amplifier is using a power supply with the ground pin connected. This will help to reduce noise.